Fingers Crossed (Synacky)

Chapter Nine

Zacky had two appointments that Dr. Wright had helped him to schedule on the tour. One in Bangkok, Thailand, and one in a city near Jakarta, Indonesia. He wasn’t sure how he was going to get there, what he would tell his band mates, but something would work out.

And when it came time for them, Zacky made it work.

His first appointment was at 10:00 AM in Thailand, 9:00 PM in his system. But since they had been up late the previous night, the show ran late, Brian and Matt had an interview to do, they attended a small after party and then Brian and Zacky had an after party of their own in their hotel room shower, he knew everyone would be asleep by then.

So he set his alarm on his phone, making it quiet so hopefully only he could hear it, and his sleep was restless. He couldn’t get comfortable and his mind was filled with nervous thoughts. He’d be going in for his first round of chemotherapy. What if something went wrong? Would his hair fall out immediately? If so, he’d have to tell everyone sooner than he would have liked…

Dr. Wright had debriefed him a little bit on the side effects of chemo. She told him how important it was to let someone know if he developed a fever at any point after the treatment. She also implored him to rest whenever he was tired. “You might have to skip out on a show or two-“

“Nope. Not happening.” Zacky had replied.

When his alarm hummed softly the next morning, Zacky was exhausted. He silenced it quickly, glancing over at his sleeping fiancé. Brian was snoring, sprawled out across the bed, even drooling a little. He wasn’t going to be waking up for a while.

Zacky scrawled a note on the complementary pad of paper in the small kitchen portion of their room, leaving the note on his pillow. It wasn’t much, just explained how he couldn’t sleep, so he went out to see the town. Brian shouldn’t worry about him. He left his phone on the floor, trying to make it look like it had been left behind on accident. He kissed Brian’s forehead softly, and slipped out of the room.

~*~

He had to have a check up before he underwent the therapy. And he didn’t mind that. The doctor who was treating him had a British accent, of all things, and when Zacky asked her about it she explained she had originally moved to Thailand for missionary work. But she specialized in cancer treatment instead of pediatric health, and here she was.

He answered yes three times to drinking, smoking, and being sexually active. He didn’t chew tobacco, and as far as he knew (or at least for the past couple years) he was drug free.

“Plus, I’m gay.” He told her. “I don’t know if that affects anything, but that’s the sexually active I’m talking about. Also, I’ve promised not to drink until… until we’ve got this whole thing sorted out.”

‘Until I die.’ He thought to himself, ‘No more scotch, or whiskey, or liquor, or wine.’ It was a sad, sad realization. But it was worth it. He wanted to continue living for as long as possible.

He had seen people who had undergone chemotherapy in movies and stuff, and the way they looked had always frightened him. Pale, sickly, without hair and weak. He asked the woman about this and she assured him that what he had seen had been from months of treatment. He shouldn’t feel that way initially, and his hair shouldn’t be expected to fall out for another two to three weeks.

“You should actually feel fine.” She told him, “The session itself shouldn’t even hurt, we’ll just inject the drugs into your veins via IV for a while. Then you shouldn’t even feel side effects for another four to six hours.”

She prepped the needle and his arm as she continued, “Of course, you will have to refrain from intercourse after the treatment.”

“For how long?” Zacky asked, wincing as the needle slipped into his vein.